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Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

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Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not even compete with Android, just build a better Android phone, and sell it near cost (or at cost). Would have given them troves of data I'm sure. The muscle is around contract negotiation with the carriers and co-opting those partnerships, but they had the money to burn on this.

Who in their right mind would buy a Facebook phone, considering the neverending security issues, data leaks and total disregard for user privacy?

7-10 years ago it would have sold. Especially if they marketed is as "use FB as your address book".

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#272

Our startup spends a little bit on Facebook Ads (across FB, Instagram, etc). It's very clear over the past few months that there's trouble in the ads engine. Attribution is a mess, ad efficiency fluctuates randomly, the UI and API are flaky. I don't know whether this is a result of the ios privacy changes, the broader economy affecting ad spend, or internal issues... Maybe a mix. But it's clear that Meta's main reven…

I haven't done much with Facebook ads since 2019, but back then the UI was a flaky, buggy mess. It was pretty terrible to work with. At one point they had a "Power Editor" and then a simpler ads interface. They combined these into one unified tool and it was pretty rough.

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#273
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've gotten so damn greedy. On the mobile app literally over half my feed is ads.

Meanwhile I constantly get ads for restaurants and other businesses almost everywhere but the state I live in (California). I routinely get ads for Boston, NY, Japan, Taiwan, Germany. I've been to NY and Japan but none of the other places. So I don't think it's using my previous locations.

If you work somewhere like Facebook, this is totally unsurprising. There are probably thousands of engineers writing yet-another-framework and working on the 100th re-invention of the wheel for some random internal product that users will never see. The engineers actually solving business problems are almost always understaffed and under-appreciated, hence why the product sucks.

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#274
post #161

> “I had hoped the economy would have more clearly stabilized by now, but from what we're seeing it doesn't yet seem like it has, so we want to plan somewhat conservatively,” Zuckerberg said. A Meta spokesperson declined to comment. The economy is stabilizing. It's being weaned off of ultra-loose money for the first time in years. The stock market is starting to behave more rationally, demanding that a company whose…

I agree with you. But I also think this companies have potential for earning money. Real money. FB has incredible aí models and platforms as well as interesting hw products. But they keep pushing publicity for creepy projects such as their second life version.

So what happens is that they have tons of fantastic things they do not properly use.

I also think that media has chosen Zuckerberg to hit. Yeah. Lots of contradictions etc, but if anything, he is not stupid.

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#275
post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got 3 hards only 6 months ago. How do you know what they are asking 'for years' do you have access to their questions or something.

I am familiar with Meta's interviewing policy, which proscribes LC "hard" type problems. I don't know the contents of every single interview, obviously. Your interviewer(s) violated explicit policy if you were given LC hards.

In a way does it matter? The interviewers aren’t making the final decisions and the actual hiring committee aren’t stupid and should be able do some basic normalization.

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and the reply they would receive from their friend would be a polite request to touch grass. People in the real world use instagram and whatsapp all the time without any moral qualms. The main reason facebook as a product is on a decline is because it is simply not interesting to younger people anymore. And even then, FB still manages to occasionally produce features that capture a lot of the audience back. FB…

I don't think "touch grass" is an appropriate response to legitimate questions of professional ethics. Comments like this are why I think ethics courses should be mandatory for any CS or engineering degree.

Stating "you should break contact with the recruiter because Meta is causing irreparable damage to society" is not a "legitimate question of professional ethics." It's like saying "you should be rushing the capitol, because democrats are causing irreparable damage to society by stealing the election", and then claiming it was a legitimate question of ethics of democracy. For both of which, the suggestion to touch grass feels pretty appropriate.

I agree with your take on ethics courses being mandatory for CS or engineering college students though. It was mandatory at my college, and I found it to be pretty useful.

EDIT: as pointed out, i incorrectly used "contract" instead of "contact" in the first sentence. Fixed, as it doesn't meaningfully change my point at all. The part relevant to the point I was making was in the "... because Meta is causing irreparable damage to society" half of the sentence.

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#277
post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Active interview loops will continue," but also "we will not make any offers until the freeze is lifted." So, go figure. Edit: IC7+ is explicitly not frozen. > The only roles that will remain open are SWE IC7+, Data Center roles, and 2023 Intern, Pathway and AI STE class hiring

Imagine being of IC7+ caliber and voluntarily deciding to jump on this sinking ship. I doubt such a person exists. Might be an opportunity to upsell yourself into an IC7[+] offer, though.

Money is still a good motivator

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#278
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Leetcode problems doesn't mean leetcode.com problems in a narrow sense (aka copy paste). It means reasonably complex algorithmic and data structure problems you're supposed to solve by coding under pressure, quickly, in interview conditions. And if you think that's not happening, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

I suppose I AM confused then. I don't mind someone asking me complex algorithmic problems as long as we're WORKING toward a solution together. To me, leetcode means, "you have 45 minutes to solve these 2 or 3 problems... I'll watch". Algorithmic thinking is kinda what I do. So solving those problems doesn't feel like a bad proxy for how I might perform on the job.

Yeah, we all solve problems using algorithms.

However, how often do you come up with high performance, close to optimal algorithms, on your own, within 45 minutes?

How often do you implement heaps and such as part of your day job, versus using standard libraries or common ones?

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#279
post #13
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really hyperbolic. Facebook is not even closely comparable to those. Additionally, there's no market indication that won't be a need for services like AWS or hardware provided by Apple. It's really weird how many people seem to _want_ the tech industry to just wither and die. It's unlikely and unrealistic. There may be a sharp correction, but it's unrealistic to think that the behemoths with a moat are going…

No one said anything about tech dying (I said startups), but a repricing for sure. We don't even know the market demand for these products because cheap money has made everyone a startup founder, and every company pivoted to providing a "tech" solution when it might not have been economically viable or provided any profit.

> No one said anything about tech dying (I said startups)

You wrote: “Since most tech/saas companies sell/support other saas companies, they all go down.”

Re: Meta announces hiring freeze, warns employees of restructuring

#280

Our startup spends a little bit on Facebook Ads (across FB, Instagram, etc). It's very clear over the past few months that there's trouble in the ads engine. Attribution is a mess, ad efficiency fluctuates randomly, the UI and API are flaky. I don't know whether this is a result of the ios privacy changes, the broader economy affecting ad spend, or internal issues... Maybe a mix. But it's clear that Meta's main reven…

Our CPIs have been absurd ever since the privacy changes. Meta is fucked and I don’t think people realize how much of an effect this is going to have on the entire internet.

There are large downstream effects the iOS privacy changes are having on mobile advertising and the viability of companies that rely on mobile programmatic to bring people in the door.

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